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Monday, 19 August 2013

A Frenchman in Brighton in the 1850s

Francis Wey, a French writer, travelled to England in 1856
with the idea of recording his impressions of the English and English life. His
account refers to many details of clothes, from the marvellous riding-habits of
ladies in Hyde Park to the rags of beggars on the London streets. Yet Wey is
extremely surprised to find that English men bathe in the sea naked. On a visit
to Brighton Wey, believing that he should respect local customs, reluctantly
abandons his clothes in the safety his bathing machine and ventures cautiously
into the sea. However, after a long swim he learns a rather odd lesson about
English prudishness.

He writes:

‘I spent two days at Brighton, where an Englishman, I am
told, can find enjoyment. […] In fine weather bathing takes place in full view
of the front, swarming with idlers of both sexes. Men go into the water stark
naked, which surprised me, knowing how easily shocked English people are. Never
shall I forget my bathe at Brighton! It was on a Sunday, at the time at which
worshippers return from church. I had been assigned a cabin in which to
undress. It was a wooden construction on wheels placed at the water’s edge,
with steps half-submerged by the waves. Getting into the sea was easy enough, as
my cabin screened me from view.

Unfortunately, I went for rather a long swim, as I wanted to
get a good view of Brighton from afar. […] When at last I regained my depth, I
found that my cabin, which I had left with water lapping the hub of the wheels,
was now high and dry at fifteen paces from the sea. To put a finishing touch to
my discomfort, three ladies, a mother with her daughters, had settled
themselves on camp stools in my direct line of approach! They seemed very
respectable females, and the girls were both pretty. There was no possibility
of reaching my cabin without passing in front of them. They each held a
prayer-book and they watched me swimming about with serene unconcern. To give
them a hint without offending their modesty, I advanced cautiously on all
fours, raising myself by degrees as much as decency permitted. […] As the
ladies did not move, I concluded they had not understood my dilemma […]. What
was I to do? Remain in the water and inconvenience my host, or emerge from it
and affront the ladies? I determined on the latter course. After all, why had
they settled just there? I rose slowly, like Venus, from the waves. Striving to
adopt a bearing both modest and unconcerned, reminiscent of the lost traditions
of innocence of a younger world, I stepped briskly past the three ladies who
made no pretence of looking away. I felt the blood rushing to my face. […]

Bathing machines at
the seaside

When at last we got home, Sir
Walter [his host] teased me good naturedly about my misadventure, and his wife
told me that she knew the ladies, who were very puritanical! They disapproved
of bathing on Sundays and had adopted that unexpected method of discouraging
Sabbath-breakers. Could one conceive a stranger mode of teaching a transgressor
to be virtuous or of performing an act of religious fervour?

I would, perhaps, have omitted
this incident, but for its bearing on various observations I have made on the
inconsistency of English prudishness. In reality it is mostly offended by words. If one can replace the actual
expression by some euphemism conveying exactly the same meaning, all is well!’